The Hammersmith Society announced the winners of its prestigious Awards, presented by the Society’s patron, Cllr P J Murphy, Mayor of Hammersmith and Fulham, on Wednesday 29 September at its AGM at Riverside Studios. 

The Environment Award

Quaker Meeting House, 30 Bradmore Park Road

Quaker meeting entrance

Quaker meeting house frontage

2021 Environment Award – Quaker Meeting House

Quaker meeting plaque

Quaker meeting room 1

Quaker meeting room 2

Quaker meeting wooden ceiling

Quaker meeting outside and garden

(Click on images for full-sized versions, then scroll through the set)

This is a special jewel in the Bradmore Park Road street environment. It celebrates the opportunity of an open site to create a graceful pause in the line of Victorian terraces, each side sharing its front landscaping with the street. With its simple brick single storey walls, it provides an effective foil to the decorated Victorian terraces.  It is softly radiused to create an inviting entrance; with artful metalwork on the gates and fence screens offering glimpses through to the meadow garden inside. The high rotunda reveals itself in longer street views, a sculptural form which expresses the Meeting Room, the heart of the building within. The Meeting House provides for communal facilities as well as Quaker activities, joining with the Grove Neighbourhood Centre opposite to complete this cultural centre to Brackenbury.

Architect: Stewart Dodd

The Tom Ryland Award for Conservation

Mission Hall, 41 Iffley Road

Mission Hall, 1883-4, by H R Gough. 41 Iffley Road.
Grade II listed, blue plaque (John Campbell, artist).

The prize should be shared with the original builders of Iffley Road, bravely introducing the contrasting scale and majesty of the Mission Hall to relieve the long terraces which line this street. It was built in 1883 to provide Sunday school premises for the church of St John the Evangelist, which is at the lower end of Iffley Road. Standing proudly amongst the line of Victorian terrace houses each side, this Grade 2 listed building brings an arresting sense of scale and gravitas to both Iffley Road and Tabor Road. For many years it has been used as a scenery painting studio, and it has now been given a new lease of life through a major conversion and refurbishment to provide office, meeting and community facilities. Introducing a new purpose, a new use, is vital to the survival of a building like this which could otherwise fall redundant and be at risk of inappropriate redevelopment.

Lamington Group, Neil Davies Architects, HUT Architecture

Nancye Goulden Award

Landscaping at 245 Hammersmith Road

245 Hammersmith Road Plaza.
(More images in  the nominations below)

The Nancye Goulden Award is intended to single out smaller schemes which have improved the local environment, and this year it is awarded to the park and landscaping at 245 Hammersmith Road. It is invaluable when major projects like this remember the needs of the urban environment which surrounds them. The landscaping and recreational benefits provided by this very substantial development set a great example of how we can restore people priority in the bustle of traffic and commerce which makes up the town centre.

Sheppard Robson Architecture and Exterior Architecture

Wooden Spoons

Lyric Square drinking fountain

Drinking Fountain, Lyric Square

Thames Water are installing water fountains in locations around London in an admirable effort to reduce the use of plastic water bottles. However, one of these fountains stands in Lyric Square – lots of white plastic crowned with a bulbous blue egg, looking as if it has been left behind from a funfair event in the Square. The drinking facility is welcome, but what Thames Water label ‘the blue iconic water drop’ draws on a cartoon aesthetic which misses the mark in streetscape surroundings. While it is perhaps a small element in the context of the Square, it looks daft and completely out of place, and it is one of a hundred others which are being placed around London. One has also appeared in Hammersmith Park, but we’d prefer the effort going into fixing disused existing Victorian fountains, such as this.

5G Masts

Rylett Road 5G proposed mast and cabinets – rejected

These have become an unfortunately noticeable feature on our streetscape. While one planning law introduces design codes telling us how things should look, another is widening the scope of permitted development where it does not matter how things look – and this includes 5G masts. The masts have to earn these permitted development rights. The masts already installed reveal a very poor standard of design of a streetscape element. This is unacceptable and unnecessary: the equipment assembly at the base of the masts is drab and the prominent ground level cabinets are appalling, lacking the qualities of elegance and uniformity essential to create an acceptable presence on our streets. Instances of poor design in a streetscape can soon coalesce to create an impression of neglect and mediocrity which stifle aspirations of urban quality. In sum, these may be a necessary part of our telecommunications infrastructure, but they have slipped through without going near a design department and now they are to be authorised with permitted development rights. A serious failure in a planning system which promotes design codes to raise the standard of beauty around us.

For further information, please contact: Richard Winterton:

Award Nominations 2020-2021

The full list of nominations is shown below for reference. Many were carried over from the pandemic-cancelled 2020 Awards.  Those in bold/blue were shortlisted when committee members visited the nominations on 11th July. There are some more photos on our Instagram page

Environment Award
245 Hammersmith Road – public space 245 Hammersmith Road Green Wall	245 Hammersmith Road Plaza
Quaker Meeting House, Bradmore Park Road	Quaker Meeting Room
Tom Ryland Award for Conservation
DIMCO buildings [Photo: Wikipedia: Alexander Williams]	Dimco – “Exhibition London”
Mission Hall, 1883-4, by H R Gough. 41 Iffley Road.   The conversion design deserves recognition, including suspended mezzanine floor plates preserving the church hall volume of the original building. Grade II listed, blue plaque (John Campbell, artist).	Mission Hall – plaques
Nancye Goulden Award
Greenside Road SUDS
River Sculptures Those of you who like to stroll along the Thames foreshore at low tide between Bell Steps by the Black Lion Pub at the East end of Hammersmith Terrace and Chiswick Eyot, will have seen the constantly changing stonescape which has been created over many years by the local artist @Neel.Bakhle. It is a living and constantly changing sculpture panorama formed by the rise and fall of the river Thames in partnership with the artist who has grown up by the river.
Wooden Spoon
The “Jumble of buildings” at White City / Imperial College	The “Jumble of buildings” at White City / Imperial College
Lyric Square fountain. Much as we appreciate provision of drinking water without plastic waste, we much prefer the granite public monument variety as we said a couple of years ago. Automatic nomination	Hammersmith Bridge closed since 10th April 2019 [BBC]